Albania History Timeline

The Republic of Albania is a country in south-eastern Europe. It borders Kosovo to the north, Montenegro to the northwest, Macedonia to the east and Greece to the south. The coastline west of the country consists of the Adriatic Sea and the Ionian Sea to the southwest.

According to computergees, Albania is a country on the rise, but remains one of the poorest countries in Europe. After a difficult time with 45 years as a closed dictatorship until 1991 and economic and political setbacks in the 1990s and unrest and insecurity in society after the collapse of the pyramid schemes in 1997, they managed to house 400,000 refugees from Kosovo in 1999.

The Albanians consider themselves descendants of the Illyrians. A people who in ancient times lived in the western part of the Balkan Peninsula. However, this is a view that many scholars outside Albania do not share, and the origins of the Albanians cannot be considered as clarified. The Albanian language is completely isolated within the Indo-European language family.

Probably the most famous person from the country must be Mother Teresa, who was born in Skopje. Her immensely consistent assertion of the value and right of the individual makes her efforts something very special in the history of aid organizations, possibly the most consistent efforts since Francis of Assisi, who introduced the poverty ideal into monasticism. But it created criticism, i.a. because her view of the individual also applied to the unborn fetus, which is why she was a sharp opponent of abortion. She received the Nobel Peace Prize in 1979. In 2003, she was beatified by Pope John Paul II.

TIMELINE:

2nd-4th century – the area belonged to a part of the Roman Empire. For the next 1000 years, it was part of the Greek-speaking Eastern Empire. Skanderbeg, who has since been hailed as Albania’s national hero, kept the Turks at bay until his death. Then came about 500 years of Turkish domination, which only ended with the Balkan Wars and Albania’s independence in 1912.

1912 – First Balkan War begins on October 18, when the Serbian, Bulgarian and Greek armies attack the Ottoman Empire. After three days of fighting near the city of Kumanovo (28 to 31 October 1912), the Serbian army took over the city of Skopje without fighting and continued with victories elsewhere as well. The main battles against the Turks were at Babuna, then at Bakarno Gumno and through Kosovo, the Serbian army spread to the Adriatic coast. During October, they occupied western Macedonia and Albania. The Bulgarian army occupied eastern Macedonia to the river Mesta, and the coast of it Aegean Sea east of present-day Thessaloniki in Greece. The Greek army liberated Epir and the island of Crete and then occupied the Aegean Macedonia.

World War II – During the war, the country was occupied by Italy, but had a primarily communist resistance movement under Enver Hoxha, who took power when the Italians left the country.

1997 – An armed uprising erupts and military arsenals are looted. The reason was that several companies that had arranged pyramid schemes had collapsed and many Albanians had lost their savings. A NATO force under Italian leadership – and with participation from several countries, including Denmark – was deployed to ensure peace and order. President Sali Berisha was forced to resign and before that to release the prominent socialist leader Fatos Nano. After the parliamentary elections, the Socialists came to power.

1975 – Albania is the only country in Europe to refuse to participate in the Conference on Security and Cooperation in Europe, precisely because this conference was seen as an attempt by the superpowers to consolidate their positions in this part of the world.

1998 – On September 12, an assassination attempt is made on a prominent Democratic politician, Azem Hajdari, who provokes unrest. Fatos Nano fled abroad and was replaced by another socialist leader Pandeli Majko.

2002 – A “weapons culture” exists in Albania. There are still hundreds of thousands of weapons in circulation that were captured by the police in 1997, and any Albanian has access to acquire a Russian pistol, a Chinese submachine gun, or land for air rockets. Many of these weapons are resold to other countries around the world.

2003 – In M arch declared Albania to dispose of chemical weapons in the Convention on Chemical Weapons. One month later, 110 of the 151 countries that have ratified the convention agreed to tighten the non-proliferation treaty. Albania itself began destroying its chemical weapons, although the Organization for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons did not have information on either the number or the nature of the Albanian chemical weapons.

2007 – US President George W. Bush visits Albania in June, speaking out in favor of Kosovo’s independence.

2008 – On March 15, a weapons dump exploded in the village of Gërdec near Tirana, killing more than 27 people and injuring more than 100 people. The disaster became a national scandal and forced the defense minister to resign. There were a large number of irregularities around the landfill where an Albanian company dismantled aging Albanian weapons and explosives and sold them as waste. The event was broadcast in the show ” Destroyed in Seconds ” on the Discovery Channel.

2011 – In January, a video was released showing the Deputy Prime Minister entering into an agreement on corruption with the Minister of Economy. On January 21, the opposition therefore staged a large demonstration in Tirana with about 200,000 participants under the slogan that the Deputy Prime Minister should resign. It clashed with security forces and 4 protesters were killed. Again on January 28 and February 4, new demonstrations were held facing the government.

Albania History Timeline